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Sw Ohio Cicada Invasion


T10X

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Cincinnati is expecting the 17yr brood X cicada invasion mid May. Experts predict 5 BILLION of the bugs. Ought to make for some interesting cache logs. I remember as kids playing baseball with them. One would stand ready with a wiffle ball bat while another would shake a nearby tree. Whoever hit one over a marked line would score a run. How do you plan to deal with these pests?

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5 billion sounds low. Every year the lake shore communities get swarmed with mayflies. They get so thick the cities have to use snowplows and front-end loaders to clean up the dead bug bodies off the roads. The giant piles of bugs have a really nasty odor.

 

I just go about my normal caching and remember they are all part of nature.

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I've been to Lake Erie about 15 times in July and have seen the mayflies. I've heard the stories about using the loaders to scrape them up but have been lucky enough in all my visits not to witness it. At least the mayflies are quiet, when the cicadas arrive it will sound like a alarm clock going off 24/7.

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Mayflies are like large mosquitos, mostly all wings. Cicada bodies are half the length of your little finger. I'm glad I'm not a 4leafclover cus I'd be eaten alive by the cicadas! If you survive their attack 4leaf, I'm looking forward to your battle stories with them. T10X

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I've been to Lake Erie about 15 times in July and have seen the mayflies. I've heard the stories about using the loaders to scrape them up but have been lucky enough in all my visits not to witness it. At least the mayflies are quiet, when the cicadas arrive it will sound like a alarm clock going off 24/7.

If what you're calling mayflies are what we call fishflies here in MI, they're gross! Near water, they cover the store windows so thickly at night, being attracted to the light, that you can't see inside the store. They also swarm the lamp posts and, when on the ground under the lights, are as slippery as any ice. They only have a lifespan of 24 hours or so, but they're awful and they stink! :lol:

 

On a good note:

Mayflies indicate a healthy environment. They are sensitive to pollution and other changes and will disappear from unhealthy water bodies.

 

So, I guess we shouldn't complain, huh? :lol:

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Mayflies are like large mosquitos, mostly all wings. Cicada bodies are half the length of your little finger. I'm glad I'm not a 4leafclover cus I'd be eaten alive by the cicadas! If you survive their attack 4leaf, I'm looking forward to your battle stories with them.  T10X

oh, I already plan to leave them in caches I find this spring/summer.

 

I vividly remember their last emergence. I'm looking for a tent size HAZMAT suit for myself. I'm expecting to be knocked unconscious by a few.

Edited by 4leafclover
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Are mayflies also called candian soldiers?

Yes, I've heard them called that before. It's because they seem to flood into the US from Canada across the Great Lakes. Someone once told me that they are called Yankee Raiders on the Canadian shore.

Edited by Stunod
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The critters have already emerged from Northern GA to Mid KY, all we need here in Cincinnati is a good soaking rain (which we've had threat of for two days now) and we should be getting that mid-late this week, so this weekend might not be so bad, but they'll be in force by early next week.

 

I'm already planning on doing most of my caching out-of-town for the next month or two just so I don't get knocked in the head. It's bad enough half the work I do is outside where I'll be attacked, don't need to cut my caching down too.

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It depends on what part of town you go to. To the north and east not to bad, but in my yard they are terrible. I shoveled a wheelbarrel full one day around 2 trees, 2 days later there were twice as many. This is no lie, there's a hole in the ground about every 3 sq in. Today my son and I were taking turns shaking them out of the trees and batting them with a wiffle ball bat. They also make a screeching mating call, it sounds like a siren going off. Local TV measured the noise with a decibal meter but I don't recall what it was, maybe around 97 decb. When your around as many as I am, the dead ones start to stink. At least they can't hurt you, just annoying as hell. They'll be here till the end of June.

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